


it all fades but you.

by tobeconvincedoflove



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Child Abuse, Gen, Gun Violence, Hospitals, M/M, Robert Parrish Is His Own Warning, because let's make this angstier, i promise i don't hate declan, ronan cries a lot so that's probs ooc, this is an if i stay au, this is my first work in this fandom pls be kind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-04-17 16:39:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14193207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobeconvincedoflove/pseuds/tobeconvincedoflove
Summary: When Robert Parrish bought a gun, Adam knew that was what was going to kill him. It was a sick thought that started as a flickering on an already shitty night, but the more times his dad pulled it on his son and never fired it, Adam knew his luck was running shorter.Tonight, with Ronan Lynch still sitting at the end of the drive, Adam’s luck runs out.(title taken from It All Fades Away from The Bridges of Madison County)





	it all fades but you.

**Author's Note:**

> there's a lot that could be upsetting re: Adam and Robert Parrish so please be safe friends

When Robert Parrish bought a gun, Adam knew that was what was going to kill him. It was a sick thought that started as a flickering on an already shitty night, but the more times his dad pulled it on his son and never fired it, Adam knew his luck was running shorter.

Tonight, with Ronan Lynch still sitting at the end of the drive, Adam’s luck runs out. 

It’s after his dad punches him so hard that Adam hits his head on the railing on his way down. Adam has just managed to roll over onto his back, is trying to control the nausea and piece together what he’s saying. He think he hears the slam of a door, and thinks of Ronan. 

Adam hears two pops, feels a sticky wetness on his chest. Adam’s cheek falls back into the dirt. 

Suddenly, Adam is unconscious.

:: ::

Adam wakes up. He’s still lying in the dirt, but he doesn’t feel anything. It’s like time has reversed, or at least stalled; Adam stands just as Ronan jumps out of the car, tries to stop him from interfering, yelling that he’s fine, that his dad missed.

Ronan runs right through him. 

Adam whips around, looking for Noah. He’s not there. Ronan is on his knees, Henrietta dirt blowing and staining black jeans. He’s not saying words, more like a high-pitched keen, harsh breathing the only sound as his hands press against… they’re against Adam’s chest. 

“Someone call a fucking ambulance!” he screams, and then the sound continues. Adam looks, prays that Robert isn’t taking aim at Ronan. 

Robert Parrish is nowhere to be seen. 

“Someone please! Parrish, goddammit, wake up. _Adam_.” Adam wants to turn away, wants to hug Ronan, but he can’t fucking move. He’s frozen and watching as Ronan calls his name over and over again. 

“I’m okay,” Adam whispers, drops to his knees. “Ronan, I’m okay, I’m right here.” He wants back, wants to be back in his body, to stop fucking hearing the noises coming out of Ronan’s mouth. 

Ronan’s pressing his sweatshirt against Adam’s chest, is staring at Adam’s face like he can will the eyes to open. Adam is sitting in the dirt, staring as he watches himself bleed out. He barely hears the sirens until the ambulance is there. 

Ronan isn’t allowed into the vehicle, but Adam clambers in anyways. 

There’s a lot of talking, very quickly. Adam hears gunshot, nicked a lung, barely breathing, and there are hands all over his body. Someone is on the phone with what sounds like the hospital, but two others have their hands where Ronan’s used to be, painting bright blue nitrile a dark red. 

“Noah,” Adam whispers, and from another corner of the ambulance Noah emerges. Adam runs across to him, but again, it’s like he’s not even fucking there. Noah’s eyes are wide, and then he’s gone again. 

What the fuck is happening? 

Ronan can’t see him, _Noah_ can’t see him, but that’s his fucking body barely a foot away. He’s not a ghost, but he’s not entirely there. 

But then they’re at the hospital, and Adam can barely keep up until there’s a tube down his throat and a nurse is leaning over him. 

“It’s up to you now, Adam. You gotta fight if you want to stay,” she whispers, a hand reaching to touch the net that’s hiding his blood-covered hair. “I understand if you can’t, but I think you’re gonna fight. If you do, you can’t give up.” 

Adam sits in the corner, watches as a doctor cuts him open. When he starts feeling dizzy, he presses his hands against the ground, willing himself to feel the cold. There’s a beeping and a yelling, and Adam puts his head in his hands and watches as they shock his chest once, twice, and then Adam screams. 

His heart is beating again. Adam lets himself cry.

:: ::

While the nurses are sewing Adam back together, the surgeon strips off the gloves covered in Adam’s blood, washes his hands, and changes. She looks tired, hair tied back tightly, but she shrugs off her colleague’s offers of a quick coffee and walks straight out of the unit and into the waiting room.

Ronan is on his feet. Adam’s blood has crusted and dried on his hands and shirt, and it’s like the dirt hasn’t just blurred his jeans, but all of his sharp edges, too. His eyes are wide, surrounded by a wide border of red, and his shoulders are rounded and small. Gansey’s hand is on his shoulder. 

Gansey is there. 

He’s wearing his glasses, hair a mess and wearing his sweatpants and an old crew shirt. His hands are shaking, and Adam suddenly has so many words that have never been there before. Adam remembers when they sat in those exact chairs waiting to hear if Ronan was alive. 

He remembers the anxiety that choked him from the inside out, and he hadn’t even been the one to find Ronan. 

Adam can’t imagine what is going through Ronan’s head. 

“Let’s sit down,” the doctor says, and it’s then that Blue bursts into the waiting area. 

“Is he okay? Is Adam okay?” Blue is openly crying, and Adam realizes the tight lines that rule her right now, from her cheekbones to the tightness of her shoulders. They don’t soften, not even when Gansey sits her down. 

“The doctor was just about to explain, Jane,” he says softly, and it’s like Blue is swallowing an entire’s lungful of air at once. She almost convulses with it, but she nods. Her hair is even wilder than normal, free from the clips and the hair ties, and it stands out all the more against the gray baggy sweatshirt and dark shorts she’s wearing. Adam thinks she doesn’t look like herself. She looks like Ronan. 

“Adam is alive,” the doctor leads with, and there’s a collective exhale of relief. “We had to revive him once during surgery, and he’s in critical condition, but he’s fighting.” Adam stops listening as she talks about how he’s in a coma, about how they’re not sure if it’s from the bullet wounds or the concussion. 

Adam doesn’t think he’s a fighter. 

He’s good at fighting, fuck, Ronan will tell you that Adam Parrish can argue until he’s out of breath. But he’s not a fighter. If he was, Adam would have been dead a long time ago. Adam isn’t build to fight; he’s built to make himself small, to stay below the radar, to quietly work and work and work and work and, eventually, leave. Adam doesn’t throw punches; fuck, he’s not even in his own goddamn body right now. Adam can’t feel the broken rib or the stitches or the concussion or anything, because he’s not _fucking_ there. 

If Adam can’t even be there for himself, what the fuck is he doing here?

Adam can’t look at his friends, not until the doctor is done talking. Ronan has made himself smaller, Blue is clutching Gansey’s hand like it’s the only thing keeping her tethered to this planet, and Gansey’s face is impressively blank. 

“Can I see him?” Ronan’s voice sounds hoarse, choked, but there’s not an ounce of the normal snarl. 

“He’s currently being situated in the ICU. It’ll be at least an hour before anyone can see him, and that’s only if the police clear it,” the doctor explains. 

“He’s in a coma… do you know when he’s going to wake up?” Blue asks, her eyes a harsh red. 

“That’s… unclear. It could be a few hours or a few days.” The doctor sounds unsteady, and Ronan lets out a harsh sound.

“Ronan,” Gansey warns, but Ronan is laughing now, a hollow, empty thing that sounds so out of place. Adam sits next to Ronan, looking closely to figure out what the fuck is going on.

“Come on, Gansey. When has Adam fucking Parrish ever slept for that long? Kind of fucked up,” he gets out, and suddenly Ronan is crying instead of laughing. It’s harsh, loud against the deafening silence of the room. 

Adam wants to cover his ears, never wants to hear those sounds, loud and harsh and so fucking agonized coming from Ronan ever again. It’s never ending, high pitched wheezes and whines, so fucking similar to when Ronan was holding Adam together in the dirt in front of his trailer. 

It’s not Gansey, but Blue who throws her arms around Ronan, latches onto him until the sounds finally stop, and doesn’t let go until he’s breathing normally again. 

Adam is still sitting next to Ronan. Adam can’t fucking take this anymore.

:: ::

“Ronan.” The doctor had left, and the police had arrived. They found Robert Parrish, passed out in a pool of his own vomit. They needed Ronan’s statement.

And somehow, Declan is there. 

To the average eye, he looks as put together as ever, even though it’s nearing three o’clock in the morning. Ronan notices the missing tie, the way his socks don’t quite match the suit jacket, and he knows Declan has fucking rushed here. 

“What the fuck happened?” Declan spits. The police had taken some of the blood off of Ronan’s hands, and then they had taken him to a bathroom to wash the rest off before talking to him. “What the fuck did you do?” But he’s not angry, more resigned than anything else. 

Ronan knows he looks like he’s been crying. 

“I didn’t do _anything_. I should have fucking bashed his head in,” Ronan croaks. “What the fuck are you doing here?” 

“A friend at the station told me they were sending cops to the hospital to interview you. Forgive me for assuming the worst.” Declan isn’t pulling punches. Ronan would have fucking decked him if he did. 

“It’s Parrish, Declan. His dad fucking shot him right in front of me.” Ronan can’t help the surge of glee at the morphing of emotion on his brother’s face. It’s dampened immediately, because he can’t stop remembering how it felt to have Adam’s blood seeping through his hands. “Then he ran.” 

“Excuse us, officers, but we need to have a word outside.” That’s all Declan says before he pulls Ronan out of the door. 

Adam follows. 

“You can’t dream him anything,” is all Declan says. “You can’t dream this away.” 

Ronan gets real close to Declan’s face. Adam knows Ronan can dream things, is still trying to believe it, but Ronan isn’t going to… Ronan has no idea Adam is even _here_ , and he can’t fix this. Can he?

“Fuck you. I’m not letting him die.” Ronan’s voice is barely a whisper. “He’s not going to fucking die.”

“What happens if you do dream some magic cure that fucking works? When you die, that goes away. And so will Adam.” Declan’s voice is measured. “He’ll end up like Mom.” 

That’s when Ronan throws a punch. “What the _fuck_ are you talking about, Declan?” Ronan grunts, already swinging his fist again. Declan doesn’t hit back, just takes Ronan by the shoulders and throws him in the dirt.

“I’m not being your fucking punching bag today, Ronan. Promise me you won’t try to fix this.” Declan is panting, because Ronan just gets up again and lunges at Declan. Declan steps to the side. 

Adam wants to hide. He’s seen them fight before, but this isn’t a fight. Declan isn’t fucking hitting back, and Ronan is just hitting the asphalt. Again and again. 

“I have to!” Ronan swings at Declan, misses. He’s face down, and then he’s on his feet again. “I should have—” This, time Ronan lands on his side. “I should have _fucking_ stopped it before he shot him.” Ronan is yelling, and this time Declan doesn’t side-step, just throws his arms out and catches Ronan. Declan holds him as he screams and struggles and doesn’t loosen it, not even when Ronan goes limp and his screams have given way to sobs. One of Declan’s hands moves to the back of Ronan’s head. Ronan stumbles away, then, and the moment is gone. Ronan remembers he can’t stand Declan, and Declan remembers that if there’s one thing Ronan fucking hates, it’s Declan trying to comfort him, a pale imitation of their parents. 

Adam wants to make it stop. Wants to stop hearing Ronan cry, wants to catch Ronan and tell him that it’s okay, that he’s right here, but it doesn’t matter. 

Adam can’t stand it anymore. Can’t stand there for one more second and listen to Ronan cry. It’s not Ronan, and Adam can’t handle that Ronan is crying because of him. 

In the waiting room, Blue is shaking. Gansey is crying. Adam can’t take it anymore. 

Adam just walks straight through the doors, follows a nurse until he finds himself. 

He doesn’t know who he’s about to talk to: Cabeswater, the body in the bed, or something more like Ronan’s god. He just knows that this has to fucking stop. He can’t do this anymore.

“I’m done!” Adam yells it, doesn’t fucking care because no one can fucking hear him. “If I’m going to die, just let me die. I can’t fucking watch this anymore. If I’m dead, you shouldn’t be making me watch. You at least fucking owe me that. I can’t… I can’t… watch _him_. I don’t know what you want from me! If this is your fucked up way of seeing if I’m ready to die, I’m fucking there. Just make it _stop_.” 

Adam doesn’t know when he started crying, but it won’t stop. The tears feel like nothing leaving his eyes, not warm or cold or wet or anything. Adam feels another wave of hopelessness, so strong that it makes him nauseous, and he just can’t fucking do it anymore. He’s done. He doesn’t care if he has to rip the fucking wires out himself—

“Adam?” Adam whips around, and he’s face to face with Noah. Noah, who looks like he’s the one seeing a dead person. 

“You can… you can see me?” Adam’s still crying, and then Noah wraps his arms around Adam. 

“You don’t want this.” Noah’s voice is firm; it doesn’t feel like there’s anything holding Adam, but it’s a comfort that he needs nonetheless. “Adam, you have to go back.” 

“I’m _trying_ ,” Adam whispers. “If you can see me, does that mean?” 

“Adam, Ronan is about to sneak in here. You need to go _back_.” Noah’s voice is the strongest it has ever been. 

“I don’t know how to fix this.” Adam can’t look at Noah. “I’ve just been… stuck. You couldn’t see me, in the ambulance.” 

“You can go back. Just lay back down,” Noah urges. 

“That’s not going to work. If it were that fucking easy, then what’s the point of it all?” Adam says, and now Noah is giving him the eyes he gives him whenever he knows his dad is being more of a dick than normal. 

“I don’t know, they just said that you were starting to get worse and Ronan just–” Noah is cut off by the door opening. It’s Ronan, slinking in. 

“Noah?” Ronan croaks, but he just pushes past Noah and straight to the bed. Adam doesn’t want to look, can’t see himself with the tubes and the wires and can’t stand to watch Ronan anymore. 

“Let him bring you back. I know you’re scared—” Adam starts to cut off Noah, but Noah just shakes his head. “You’re afraid. That’s okay.” If it were anyone else speaking, if it were Gansey or Ronan, Adam would have already exploded at them. But it’s Noah. “You don’t have to pretend you’re not, but you have to go back.” 

“Noah, who the fuck are you talking to?” Ronan mutters, but he’s mostly focused on holding Adam’s hand. 

But then Noah’s gone. Ronan scoffs for a moment, and Adam lets out a breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding. Ronan can’t see him. That means he’s not dead yet. Right?

“Adam,” Ronan says, both of his hands, bruised and scraped raw from his not-fight with Declan, carefully holding the one of Adam’s not weighted down by an IV. “Adam, I’m sorry.” 

“It’s not your fault.” Adam doesn’t know why he’s responding. He’s probably about to die, right the fuck in front of himself. 

“I should have… I don’t have a lot of time. That nurse who’s honestly capable of murder is gonna kick me out, but in case you don’t… fuck, if you’re not gonna make it through the night, I can’t not say it,” Ronan starts. 

“I’m not gonna… _fuck_. I can’t _do_ this,” Adam says, stuffing the heels of his hands against his ears. He’s leaning against the bed, and Adam feels so _tired_. 

“I’m sorry. I should have stopped him. Before the gunshot, before he shoved you off the stairs… I should done something the second I knew what was going on. You would have fucking killed me, but then you wouldn’t… I don’t know. I don’t know, Adam.” 

Ronan doesn’t call Adam by his first name, anymore. He makes Adam sound like a prayer. 

“I wouldn’t have… I’m sorry, Ronan. I never wanted you to see this,” Adam whispers. “Not any of this.” The exhaustion is seeping into all of him, now, and he’s laying down on the bed. 

“Gansey’s calling every doctor on the east coast, trying to find someone to bring in to do something. Blue won’t leave his side; she hasn’t stopped shaking. I swear if Gansey wasn’t there she’d have shaken off the damn chair,” Ronan says, his fingers ghosting circles over Adam’s. “I… I don’t know how to fix this.” 

It’s not Ronan’s to fix. It never has been. Adam Parrish doesn’t need a savior, doesn’t need a reason to stay. Noah was right; he’s terrified. He’s terrified because he doesn’t want to talk to CPS, doesn’t want to face his father, doesn’t know if he can look Ronan in the eyes. He’s scared because the plan that he has clutched to with bloody and bruised and calloused fingers since the age of twelve is slipping through them like dirt.

Adam needs… he needs… 

Before he can register what he’s doing, before he can overthink it and take it back, Adam puts his hand in Ronan’s. It’s warm. He can feel it, strong and steady in his own. 

Adam is so tired.

A nurse is entering the room. Ronan startles. 

“Fucking fight, Parrish. Or it’s Murder Squash every time I sneak back in here,” he whispers. He’s standing, his hand slipping from Adam’s as he stands with his palms raised. The nurse is not amused. 

Adam’s eyes slip closed as the nurse leads Ronan from the room.

:: ::

Ronan has been sitting in the waiting room for less than an hour when the doctor comes out again. Noah is there, now, and no matter what the fuck Ronan says he won’t tell him who the fuck he was talking to when they were both in the room.

They’re all on their feet, instantly. Gansey is mostly holding Blue up, but there’s enough tension that Ronan can feel it all about to snap.

“Is he okay?” Ronan’s voice is gruff. He can’t handle another of these conversations; Adam needs to fight, Adam is getting worse, Adam might not make it through the night… he can only guess what this one is going to be. 

“Let’s sit down,” the doctor says. There’s a redness around her eyes, and that’s never good. They do as she asks, and Ronan can feel his eyes water and the doctor hasn’t even said it yet. It’s almost dawn; light is starting to filter through the darkness in warm reds, so pale and warm, perfect. 

It reminds Ronan of Adam, in the moments when they’re not cutting each other and themselves with their own sharp edges. When they’re in the BMW, driving towards the same light, racing to get back to Antietam lane before it’s gone. 

“Adam’s vitals are stabilizing. He’s starting to breathe on his own, and we suspect he’s going to wake up within the next forty-eight hours,” she says, and she can’t keep the smile off of her face. “He’s not completely out of danger, but if he keeps going this way, by afternoon we can start weaning him off the ventilator.” 

Noah smiles.

:: ::

“Hey, Parrish. Think you can open your eyes for me?” That’s a voice he should recognize, Adam knows this, despite the fact that awareness is washing over him like waves onto his toes. He can distantly register a repeated hiss, a slow beeping, and he realizes there’s a weight on his hand. And just like that, Adam knows it’s Ronan holding his hand, Ronan who’s asking him to wake up.

But it’s so hard to open his eyes. He manages a sliver, and then the light is so blinding that his eyelids slam shut again. The weight on his hand is gone, but it’s back quickly. 

“I know it’s hard; I turned down the lights. Please, Adam, you can do it,” Ronan says softly, and Adam realizes there’s something different, and he needs to see that Ronan is okay. 

It takes a few tries, but eventually Adam’s eyes stay open, and it’s like awareness has slammed him in the face. Everything is slow, dulled, but Adam takes in Ronan’s tired face and then suddenly he can feel something on his face, and there’s a stinging in his right arm. 

He can feel it. That means he’s alive. 

“Hey, Adam,” Ronan says, and a smile breaks out on his face. “How are you feeling?” 

“Good,” Adam tries to get out, but it’s more of a harsh crack than anything else. Adam frowns; his throat is so sore. 

“Fuck, yeah, I forgot about that. Here.” Ronan is holding a cup with a straw to Adam’s mouth. Adam reaches with heavy arms to try and grab it, but there’s a pain in his chest when he does, though it’s quickly smothered by whatever drugs he’s on. With his other hand, Ronan gently guides them to rest back against the hospital bed. “Just relax. I got it.” Gently, Ronan removes the oxygen mask on Adam’s face, presses the straw against his lips.

When Adam takes the first sip, it tastes so clean and clear and crisp that Adam wants to cry. It’s heaven, easing his throat. 

“Thanks,” Adam pants, surprised at how breathless he is. Ronan moves to put the mask back on Adam’s face, but Adam just shakes his head. 

“Come on Parrish. You still need it,” Ronan argues weakly. His hands are still scabbed, bruised, but he’s changed his clothes since that night. Adam moves his arm, grabs Ronan’s hand, frowning at the mottled skin. “Don’t worry about that. I’m okay.” 

“What… how long have I been here?” Adam croaks. He wants to curse the weakness in his voice, the prolonged confusion the painkillers keep pressing on him. 

“Your doctor can explain better. She’s gonna want to see you, now that you’re lucid.” That’s all the explanation Ronan gives for reaching over and pressing the call button next to Adam’s head. 

“Ronan, you didn’t need to—” But Adam is really short of breath, now, and he’s struggling to sit up, until Ronan is there. Ronan’s sitting next to him on the bed, one hand lightly on Adam’s chest, the other gripping his hand tightly.

“Take it easy. Stressing yourself is just going to make the whole thing longer.” Ronan’s voice has a tone Adam hasn’t heard before, almost stern. Sighing, Ronan moves the oxygen mask back on Adam’s face. He looks away, and Adam can see the hand that’s not holding his own is shaking. “I’m just glad you’re going to be okay.” 

Adam wants to reply, but he doesn’t want muffled words said behind oxygen masks to be misunderstood. He wants to tell Ronan that he was there for all of it, that he’s sorry for not coming back sooner. 

But Ronan squeezes his hand, grips it tighter when the door opens and the doctor describes exactly how bad it is. And suddenly explaining doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Ronan doesn’t let go, not once, and that’s all Adam needs right now. 

Ronan holds on tight, but with a gentleness he couldn’t show when holding Adam together in the dirt outside of the double-wide. Adam doesn’t remember much, but he remembers that same sensation, in the dark of the hospital room, when he wasn’t himself. 

It’s like colors of sunset outside of his window, the pale blues and reds and purples of a Henrietta ready for a rest: warm, perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first work in this fandom, so please leave a review and let me know how to write these characters better. Or just yell at me. Let me know what you think, and if you want to see my mess of a tumblr and yell at me there: thoseunheard is my handle. 
> 
> Thank you!


End file.
